Wes Jackson

Wes Jackson, "President of the Land Institute (founded in 1976) was born in 1936. After attending Kansas Wesleyan (B.A. Biology, 1958), he studied botany (M.A. University of Kansas, 1960) and genetics (Ph.D. North Carolina State University, 1967). He was a professor of biology at Kansas Wesleyan and established the Environmental Studies program at California State University, Sacramento, where he became a tenured full professor.

"Dr Jackson's writings include both papers and books. His most recent works are Rooted in the Land: Essays on Community and Place (1996), co-editd with William Vitek, Becoming Native to this Place (1994), and Altars of Unhewn Stone (1987). Meeting the Expectations of the Land (1984) was edited with Wendell Berry and Bruce Colman. New Roots for Agriculture (1980) outlines the basis for agricultural research at the Land Institute.

"The work of the Land Institute has been featured extensively in the popular media, including The Atlantic Monthly, Audubon, "The MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour." and NPR's "All Things considered." Life magazine named Wes Jackson as one of 18 individuals they predict will be among the 100 "most important Americans of the 20th century." He is a recipient of the Pew Conservation Scholars award (1990) and a MacArthur Fellowship (1992)." Interview


 * Advisory Committee, Environmental Leadership Program
 * Advisory Board, E. F. Schumacher Society
 * 2008 Fellow Lindisfarne Association
 * Council, World Future Council
 * Winner of the 2000 Right Livelihood Award

Chez Sludge
Jackson is on the Advisory Board of the Chez Panisse Foundation. The Food Rights Network released a major investigative report on July 9, 2010 titled: Chez Sludge: How the Sewage Sludge Industry Bedded Alice Waters. It examines collusion between the Chez Panisse Foundation and the SFPUC based on an extensive open records investigation of the SFPUC internal files. (To view the internal documents see: SFPUC Sludge Controversy Timeline.)

Foundation Mired in 'Sewage Sludge on Gardens'
In 2009 and 2010 a major controversy erupted in San Francisco involving Chez Panisse Foundation Executive Director Francesca Vietor when the Center for Food Safety (upon whose Advisory Board sits Alice Waters) and the Organic Consumers Association called on the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, of which Vietor is Vice President, to end its give-away of toxic sewage sludge as 'organic compost' for gardeners. In advance of the OCA's March 4 sludge protest at City Hall, the SFPUC temporarily halted the give-away.

The misleading labeled "organic compost," which the PUC has given away free to gardeners since 2007, is composed of toxic sewage sludge from San Francisco and eight other counties. Very little toxicity testing has been done, but what little has been done is alarming. Just the sludge from San Francisco alone has tested positive for 1,2-Dibromo-3-Chloropropane (a.k.a. DBCP), Isopropyltoluene (a.k.a. p-cymene or p-isopropyltoluene), Dioxins and Furans.

The Organic Consumers Association conducted a noon hour picket of Chez Panisse April 1, 2010, after Alice Waters refused a request to oppose growing food in sewage sludge. The industry front group ACSH is now making Alice Waters a poster-child for toxic sewage sludge.

Related Sourcewatch articles

 * MacArthur Fellowship: Public Issues
 * Chez Panisse Foundation